Posts Tagged ‘Health’

ScienceDaily (Oct. 23, 2008) â€” Environmental gains derived from the use
of nanomaterials may be offset in part by the process used to
manufacture them, according to research published in a special issue of
the Journal of Industrial Ecology.more here

The Council of Canadian Academies has been asked by the federal Minister of Health: â€śWhat is the state of knowledge with respect to existing nanomaterial properties and their health and environmental risks, which could underpin regulatory perspectives on needs for research, risk assessment and surveillance?â€ť

An Expert Panel on Nanotechnology has been appointed by the Council of Canadian Academies to address this question. Scientific knowledge, or evidence, is broadly interpreted to include natural sciences and engineering, as well as social sciences.more here

SAN ANTONIO, Texas (CNN) — Last week in an operating room in Texas, a wounded American soldier underwent a history-making procedure that could help him regrow the finger that was lost to a bomb attack in Baghdad, Iraq, last year.

Army Sgt. Shiloh Harris’ doctors applied specially formulated powder to what’s left of the finger in an effort to do for wounded soldiers what salamanders can do naturally: replace missing body parts.Technorati Tags: regenerative medicine, health

A probe so sensitive that it can tell whether or not a cell living within the human body is veering towards cancer development may revolutionize how future colonoscopies are done, say researchers from the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Fla.

20 May 2008â€”A group of mechanical engineers at Caltech have come up with a way to guide miniature robots in the task of inserting and positioning electrode arrays in brain tissue. What they propose would be the first robotic approach to establishing an interface between computers and the brain by positioning electrodes in neural tissue.

Carbon nanotubes1 have distinctive characteristics2, but their needle-like fibre shape has been compared to asbestos3, raising concerns that widespread use of carbon nanotubes may lead to mesothelioma, cancer of the lining of the lungs caused by exposure to asbestos4. Here we show that exposing the mesothelial lining of the body cavity of mice, as a surrogate for the mesothelial lining of the chest cavity, to long multiwalled carbon nanotubes results in asbestos-like, length-dependent, pathogenic behaviour. This includes inflammation and the formation of lesions known as granulomas. This is of considerable importance, because research and business communities continue to invest heavily in carbon nanotubes for a wide range of products5 under the assumption that they are no more hazardous than graphite. Our results suggest the need for further research and great caution before introducing such products into the market if long-term harm is to be avoided.